iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

T.J. Mitchell @workingstiff.bsky.social · 22/09/2026

Kapa haka walk signals in Wellington, Aotearoa New Zealand

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T.J. Mitchell @workingstiff.bsky.social · 20/09/2026

And reserved space to bring back at least one of these bad boys

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T.J. Mitchell @workingstiff.bsky.social · 11/09/2026

Is it a sign that I need to take an occasional break from writing about #forensics & murder & mayhem with @drjudymelinek.bsky.social when I start to see the stab wound in a lovely sliced peach?

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T.J. Mitchell @workingstiff.bsky.social · 30/08/2026

6/8 ...and when I set my VPN to spoof the nation of Mexico? There I get Lake Ontario and the unambiguous Gulf of Mexico. No dispute.

Google maps showing the Gulf of Mexico as "Golfo de México."

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T.J. Mitchell @workingstiff.bsky.social · 30/08/2026

5/8 When I set a VPN to spoof into a neutral country that still enjoys the rule of law (the Republic of Ireland) I get the truth for Lake Ontario, but some even more deeply weaselly bullshit for the Gulf of Mexico, as though it were an international dispute:

Google maps showing Lake Ontario as it is in reality: Lake Ontario.

Google maps showing the Gulf of Mexico as "Gulf of Mexico (Gulf of America)," as though this is a disputed name. It is not.

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T.J. Mitchell @workingstiff.bsky.social · 30/08/2026

4/8 Here's how weaselly the motherfuckers at Google are right now. My browser, connected to the interwebs here in the US state of California, shows these two stupid, Big Brother lies:

Google maps showing Lake Ontario as, instead "Lake America."

Google maps showing the Gulf of Mexico as, instead "Gulf of America."

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T.J. Mitchell @workingstiff.bsky.social · 15/07/2026

Should I risk the diarrhea? Do I dare to nuke a peach? #Cyclospora

A peach and two apricot-plumb thingies on a rotating microwave dish, waiting to be heated for 44 seconds in the hopes that doing so will kill any microscopic eggs of the parasitic bug cyclospora, which used to be monitored & managed by public health authorities everywhere in the United States but is now, under the Republican federal government corporate deregulation regime, causing hospital-grade cases of the explosive shits across the land for thousands of Americans who enjoy eating fruits & vegetables that haven't been cooked.

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T.J. Mitchell @workingstiff.bsky.social · 05/07/2026

The big finale from the USS San Francisco Memorial overlook at Lands End. Had to explain to some *crushed* tourists that what they were watching was, in fact, the fireworks show. Yes, being entirely swallowed by fog. As is the way of our people.

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T.J. Mitchell @workingstiff.bsky.social · 01/07/2026

I see your corgi & raise you one chihuahua-terrier mutt, Winston the Wonder Dog—a very good boy & a local boy (Pets in Need rescue, Redwood City) to boot!

A small brown dog showing sitting in a blue basket on the back of a cargo bike, parked on a San Francisco sidewalk. A Pride flag is attached to the back of the basket, behind him.

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T.J. Mitchell @workingstiff.bsky.social · 01/07/2026

At this moment I have the most #SanFrancisco #cargobike in San Francisco, and that's saying something.

The rear end of a cargo bicycle parked on a sidewalk in San Francisco. I has a Pride flag attached to a carry-basket on the rear rack, and a one-pound loaf of Boudin Bakery sourdough bread peeking up out of the street-side pannier like a baguette in a French film.

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T.J. Mitchell @workingstiff.bsky.social · 31/05/2026

Big event—? Don't forget the tall one!

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T.J. Mitchell @workingstiff.bsky.social · 29/05/2026

The Gerrymander. I come from its ass end. Learned about it in history class. It was supposed to stay there, in the land of 1812.

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T.J. Mitchell @workingstiff.bsky.social · 19/05/2026

My coauthor came up with the title b4 we wrote the book; all credit to @drjudymelinek.bsky.social

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T.J. Mitchell @workingstiff.bsky.social · 18/05/2026

Gorgeous day for a #cargobike ride in #SanFrancisco Golden Gate Park, with Winston the Wonder Dog as ballast

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T.J. Mitchell @workingstiff.bsky.social · 15/05/2026

@praddenkeefe.bsky.social, you brilliant bastid. I'd thought Say Nothing was the best work of narrative nonfiction I'd ever read, but I may be wrong. Will have to digest & decide. Everyone please read #LondonFalling, esp if you aspire to #noir storytelling. Page-turning, jaw-dropping, wicked good.

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T.J. Mitchell @workingstiff.bsky.social · 08/05/2026

#Virginia General Assembly: look at your seal. This is not a time for heavy-hearted sighs. It's time to put your foot down.

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T.J. Mitchell @workingstiff.bsky.social · 07/05/2026

Learned about this as a tourist in tropical Queensland, the Australian state that goes to eleven.

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T.J. Mitchell @workingstiff.bsky.social · 20/04/2026

Our family lived here, on Wright St in #Wellington #NewZealand, for 4 years. Those are my neighbours. Anyone in a position of power or influence you hear on the news using the word ‘unprecedented’ deserves…opprobrium. At a minimum. #ClimateChange Photo credit @unclecheese.bsky.social

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T.J. Mitchell @workingstiff.bsky.social · 07/04/2026

Hey, somebody oughta tell Air New Zealand to relax. Fuel costs are normal. Supplies are rock steady. Minister Willis keeps saying so. Boats! Contracts! High seas! All good! It can't be that fuel is costing them more. That's not what we're being told. Thank you for your attention to this matter!

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T.J. Mitchell @workingstiff.bsky.social · 28/03/2026

Srsly, #Queensland #Australia—? The trees attack? Invisible venom jellies, lurking sharks, AND stinging trees?

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T.J. Mitchell @workingstiff.bsky.social · 27/03/2026

To me, the above this straight-talking, active-voice approach—laced with humor but inducing terror—is so much more effective than the usual dry, passive-voice "can result in" signs you'll find any govt body posting anywhere:

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T.J. Mitchell @workingstiff.bsky.social · 27/03/2026

The warning signs in #Queensland #Australia remind me that the people of this vast & weird land brought us the single greatest public service campagin of all times, the www.dumbwaystodie.com train safety jingle. They do not mess around re the endangered danger bird, the cassowary, either. 1/2

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T.J. Mitchell @workingstiff.bsky.social · 17/03/2026

For this year's #StPatricksDay, a war poem by Padraic Fallon, born in 1905 in Athenry, Co Galway

Dardanelles 1916
by Padraic Fallon

Last night in stomped
Our Connaught Ranger, Private Patrick Carty
On his way:
Fully accoutred now, a ramp
Of belts and bandoliers, a bayonet
Wags at his side with no wound yet, the heavy
Haversack sits high:

Filling the back kitchen, squinting
Down from the roofbeams, shyly
Shaking hands all round the family, smiling;
Me he picks up and by God kisses me.

Up there under
The brown-white plaster an unknown soldier's face
Is weeping.

Do I remember more? The urchin daughters
Bold for once and peeping
Washed and ribboned through the door to wave
Him off on the Mail, the 4.15, and away
Where muted now in a long sand he lies, if not
Entirely melted into
The steadfast bony glare of Asia Minor.

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T.J. Mitchell @workingstiff.bsky.social · 03/03/2026

Rose crowned fruit dove in Toranga Zoo, #Sydney. @drjudymelinek.bsky.social: “Looks like a sorbet.” She’s not wrong.

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T.J. Mitchell @workingstiff.bsky.social · 10/02/2026

Beachy tomorrow & Thurs, then rain. How do I know this, you ask? Because

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T.J. Mitchell @workingstiff.bsky.social · 26/01/2026

Added 20% to bike, sapped 1% off car. (And now a better view of the #zipties I had to deploy after snapping the motor controller off its plastic mount, like the klutz I am)

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T.J. Mitchell @workingstiff.bsky.social · 26/01/2026

Timeline cleanse. Dadding the geekiest combination #EV dad/ #bike dad achievement I've yet unlocked: charging the #electricbike from the #EV car. (Look close for a bonus bike-dadding jury-rig on the bike's wee computer control. Flip bike to fix a flat, make a new problem, fix new problem. Classic!)

Middle aged geek man proudly showing off a bunch of cables connecting his electric bike to his electric car, to charge the bike's depleted battery off the car's fullish one

View of the plugs & cables connecting the car as a potential-energy power source for the bike

Angle showing the car's output plug leading to an ordinary household (New Zealand) multiplug, into which the bike charger is plugged & pulling electrons from car to bike

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T.J. Mitchell @workingstiff.bsky.social · 17/01/2026

On a #NewZealand tiki tour in #Taranaki. Wonderful day hikes in true rainforest. And I’m told there’s a big ol mountain…right there? Same vibe as biking thru SanFrancisco’s Presidio in August & I have to convince the shivering tourists that, yes, the GoldenGateBridge really is out there.

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T.J. Mitchell @workingstiff.bsky.social · 07/01/2026

Video & full story from the Minnesota Reformer @minnesotareformer.com. TW for blood in the story photo & also the video below. Story link: minnesotareformer.com/2026/01/07/i...

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T.J. Mitchell @workingstiff.bsky.social · 04/01/2026

Me: The label featuring an Irish patriot transported in 1867 by the British to their penal colony Down Under, for treason against the Crown? Fenian Hugh Brophy, who bears a resemblance to, oh, I dunno...? Wife: ... Me: Sez here he had aromatic notes of dark cherry, currant, and chocolate!

A man with a bit of a scowl, holding a bottle of wine that has a mug shot photo on its label of another man bearing a similar expression. The two men look very much alike.

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T.J. Mitchell @workingstiff.bsky.social · 31/12/2025

Yesterday, while packing for a long stay in Aotearoa, did I google “can I bring edible cricket powder into #NewZealand?” I did indeed so google. (The answer is yes, as long as its original packaging has not been opened.)

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T.J. Mitchell @workingstiff.bsky.social · 15/12/2025

Hey, @nytpitchbot.bsky.social: don’t sleep on the Gray Lady’s podcast. While GOP goons pepper-spray brown American infants, the @nytimes.com reveals who is behind this movement, who is to blame: Surprise! It’s the Democrats. That pod, It’s a mine rich and deep for your shovel, o stalwart pitchbot.

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